


Witness

by bearbaitbrook



Series: Bughead AU's [2]
Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, One Shot, Witness Protection, long distance I guess?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-16
Updated: 2020-10-16
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:54:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27036778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bearbaitbrook/pseuds/bearbaitbrook
Summary: She hadn't seen him in almost a year. One year ago, they were supposed to be graduating from high school and jetting off into the sunset that was Yale and the happy ending that awaited them outside of Riverdale.And then Stonewall had happened. Brett and Donna had almost killed Jughead and had tried to pin the blame on Betty, and when Jughead eventually proved what they had done, it got ugly. Very ugly.Fearing for their safety, Charles hid them away in witness protection until Brett and Donna were safely locked away and the threats against Jughead and Betty's lives had stopped. And he hid them separately. For the past year, Betty had been May Jones, waitress and online college student living in Los Angeles. Jughead was now Johnathan Cooper, currently residing… she didn't know where.
Relationships: Betty Cooper/Jughead Jones
Series: Bughead AU's [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1973236
Comments: 5
Kudos: 40
Collections: 8th Bughead Fanfiction Awards - Nominees





	Witness

**Author's Note:**

> All knowledge of witness protection comes from Brooklyn 99... I have absolutely no idea how any of it works, and no desire to find out, so please excuse any errors in how I portray the program.

She hadn't seen him in almost a year. One year ago, they were supposed to be graduating from high school and jetting off into the sunset that was Yale and the happy ending that awaited them outside of Riverdale.

And then Stonewall had happened. Brett and Donna had almost killed Jughead and had tried to pin the blame on Betty, and when Jughead eventually proved what they had done, it got ugly. Very ugly.

Fearing for their safety, Charles hid them away in witness protection until Brett and Donna were safely locked away and the threats against Jughead and Betty's lives had stopped. And he hid them separately. For the past year, Betty had been May Jones, waitress and online college student living in Los Angeles. Jughead was now Johnathan Cooper, currently residing… she didn't know where.

Switching last names had been the one of two concessions Charles had granted them, the one reminder of their pasts that they were allowed, given only because of how common both last names were. They hadn't been allowed anything else that could possibly let anyone make a connection to who they had been… although Betty had managed to sneak a photo of her and Jug, the photo from their first homecoming together, the one where they looked so young and happy, before the weight of Riverdale came to rest of their shoulders. She had hidden it under her floorboards, only pulling it out in the dead of night, with the curtains drawn and the door locked, when she was missing him so much that she couldn't breath. She knew for a fact that he had one with him too.

The only other item she'd been allowed to bring was his beanie. Jughead's beanie, the one she had lovingly made him after burning the original on the night the Stonies tried to take him away from her. He had given it to her as he said goodbye at the car set to take her to her new life, a life away from him. Tears had streamed down her face and she had clung to him, unwilling and unable to let go of him. Teary eyed himself again, a familiar pattern over the past week, he had reached up and pulled the beanie off of his head and placed it gently on hers. "We are partners. In life. In all of it. Ok?" 

She had nodded and kissed him deeply, just as she had that day at Sweetwater swimming hole, and had not taken the beanie off since. 

Every day was always the same: get up, get dressed, start her long shift at the 50s themed diner that reminded her of Pops, spend a few hours in this library or that coffee shop working on her online coursework (it wasn't Yale, but it was  _ something _ , and Charles had assured her that her admission had just been deferred for a year or two), go home (not that it was home without him there), rinse, repeat. At the end of every day, she eagerly checked off one box on the calendar pinned to her wall, smile growing brighter as she inched closer and closer to the end of the month, the one day each month when she would check in with her handler and receive a letter from Jug. It wasn't much - a single page, location information redacted, and it was destroyed as soon as Betty had read it, but she lived for those letters, lived for any chance she had to feel close to him. She spent her month pouring her heart out into mentally drafted letters that she later condensed into one physical one, trying to find just the right words to say to him that would assure him that she was ok, that she loved him, that she would wait for him, always.

"Earth to May!" Betty's coworker, Megan waved a hand jokingly in front of Betty's eyes, startling her from her reverie. 

"Shit, sorry," Betty said, jumping up from where she was leaning against the diner counter. She had her monthly letter to Jughead just about drafted in her head. It was almost their anniversary, four years after he had kissed her in her bedroom that first time, and she had to admit that she was more distracted than normal as the date approached. 

"There's a customer over at table 8 that's asking for you."

Betty grabbed the coffee pot and her notepad, heading for the table in the back. She almost dropped them when she saw who was in the booth. It was Charles.

"May Jones? I'm agent Kyle Bradford." He looked at Betty pointedly and then stood, shook her hand, and beckoned for her to sit down.

"What can I do for you, agent?" she asked, heart beating wildly. Charles' face was like stone, betraying nothing about why he was there.

"We are currently investigating a crime that you might have incidentally witnessed. I need you to come down to the station with me to answer some questions. Are you off soon?

"I'm done in fifteen. Can you wait?"

"I'd love a cup of coffee," he said, by way of response, and she poured him a cup before standing. She opened her mouth to ask him for a hint, an indication that Jughead was ok, but an almost imperceptible shake of Charles' head coupled with a tight smile had her shutting her mouth and hurrying away, glancing up at the clock every fifteen seconds as she tried to hurry her shift along.

"What's he want? Megan asked

"I might have witnessed something, he just needs me to answer some questions."

Her apron was off the moment the clock struck the hour, and she grabbed her purse before rushing to her brother.

He beckoned her out the door, towards his waiting car.

"Charles!" Betty cried out the moment the doors were shut and the car was in motion. "What the hell is going on? Is Jughead ok?"

"Yes, Jughead's fine. We need to move you, though, there's the possibility that your cover has been compromised. I had an agent at your apartment the minute you left for work this morning packing your things. Yes, even the items hidden under your floorboards." Betty looked at him guiltily. "Betty, I picked that apartment for you because of the loose floorboards."

"What about my lease, my job?" 

"Both will receive written notice to quit tomorrow, citing some family emergency that immediately required you to move home."

"Where am I going this time?"

"I'll tell you inside." They had pulled up to a nondescript office looking building, and Charles led her inside, through a front room littered with desks and into a more private back room. The room was mostly empty, aside from a table, a few chairs, and a worn looking sofa. 

"Wait here for a few minutes. We have one or two things to take care of, and then I'll come explain everything." He nodded to the couch, invited Betty to sit, and then went back to the front room, shutting the door behind him.

She sank into the couch gratefully, despite how uncomfortable it was. Today had been gruesome -man after man had left phone numbers on receipts or crude jokes with their orders, making her miss Jug and his gentle sense of humor. Her feet hurt, and she was exhausted, and the mere thought of being moved and starting everything all over again was overwhelming. 

Without even thinking about it, her hand drifted absently towards her heart, fingers stroking the small "J" she had tattooed there - a "J" with a small crown swinging from it. He had a "B" that matched it. They had gotten them together the night before they were torn apart, begging Toni to do it for them, even though they couldn't tell her why they were so desperate to have a piece of each other permanently inked into their being.

He had held her tightly that night in their bed after he had made love to her so bitter sweetly that they had both cried. 

"This belongs to you -always," he had said to her softly as she pressed a gentle kiss to the bandage that covered his now healing skin.

"It still does, you know." Betty hadn't noticed that the door had swung open, hadn't noticed that someone had walked in, didn't realize, for a moment, that there was only one person in the world who could possibly know what that specific piece of skin meant to her.

Her eyes popped open.

"Jug?" She ran to him, jumping into his arms. He looped his hands under her thighs, holding her to him, taking her lips in a desperate kiss.

"Oh my God - how? What?" She couldn't think - he was here, standing in front of her after a year."

"Fuck, I've missed you baby," he groaned against her lips, kissing her again, longer, gentler, before sitting down on the couch and pulling her securely into his lap, pressing kisses to any spot that he could reach.

His hands were fire on her touch-deprived body and it was a pleasure to burn.

"What? How?" she asked again, soothing his midnight curls away from his face. He reached up, gently adjusting the beanie on her head, taking his time to curl his fingers through her silky hair before he answered.

"I don't know much more than you… I was the one that asked Charles to let me surprise you here, but I don't know anything more than you about what's next. Only that one of us was compromised."

"So… we might be separated again?" she asked slowly, clinging to him a little bit tighter. She didn't know if she could let him go again.

"No, you're not," Charles responded from the doorway. 

"Charles, what's going on?" Betty asked, confused and completely overwhelmed. Jughead, able to read her better than anybody, noticed how tense her shoulders had grown and the way that her fingers instinctively curled in towards her palms. He grabbed her hands and laced their fingers together as she shifted into a slightly less compromising position that let her see Charles a bit better. 

Jughead noticed that she still leaned into him, with more points of contact between their bodies than not, as if afraid he would disappear again if she wasn't connected to him in as many ways as possible.

"I may not have been… entirely honest with you," Charles said, eyes darting back and forth between Betty and Jughead. "You are both being moved, though. And you'll be together."

"Where to?" Jughead asked, looping an arm behind Betty. He could feel her trembling next to him.

"How do you feel about Connecticut?"

Betty and Jughead both froze. "Connecticut?"

"New Haven, to be more precise."

"Charles…" Betty warned. "Please tell me this means what I think it means, and not Witness Protection trying to make a clever joke."

"It's over," Charles responded with a smile. "Donna's father was the last credible threat against you both, and he died of a heart attack a week ago. You both are free to go about your lives. I've gotten you a hotel room nearby for tonight, and then tomorrow we'll start the process of moving you back to the east coast. Yale has been alerted to your circumstances, and is eagerly prepared to welcome both of you for the fall semester."

Jughead and Betty looked at each other in disbelief, and then she burst into tears, all of the emotions of the day finally becoming too much, and she threw her arms around Jughead, face buried in his neck, as he held her tightly.

"It's over," she repeated over and over again while his thumb rubbed soothing patterns into the base of her neck.

"The hotel room is right around the corner," Charles said, handing Jughead a room key. "Why don't you head over now, and text me later if you want to meet up for dinner. It's been a long day for both if you."

"Thanks Charles. Seriously. For everything," Jughead said, grabbing the room key. He gently pulled Betty up and led her out the door, down the block to the hotel, and up to their room. It wasn't anything special, but it was the first space they'd been allowed to share together in over a year, and that alone was enough to make the room amazing.

They stayed up all night, losing themselves in each other's bodies and the stories they had to share about their time apart, the stories not deemed important enough for their letters.

"I love you, so much," he whispered into her skin as he rocked against her.

"I missed you. I missed this," she responded breathlessly, straining against him, needing more, more of  _ him _ .

"You really never took it off?" he asked her later as she playfully arranged the crown beanie in its rightful spot, holding back his soft curls.

"It's not the only thing I didn't take off," she admitted. She slipped a hand into the neck of the discarded S t shirt she was now wearing, and pulled out a chain. A chain with a delicate diamond ring on the end of it. He had given it to her right after he woke up from the Stonie's botched braining, but they hadn't told anyone, fearing the judgement that would come given they were still in high school. She had neglected to tell Charles that she had it, instead choosing to keep it secreted away, close to her heart. 

Wordlessly, he slipped the ring off the chain and gently worked it onto its rightful place, the ring finger of her left hand. "Here's to us, solving all of the mysteries in Connecticut," he said to her with a smile as he placed a kiss on the finger, just above the ring.

"And to eating a lot of pizza. Together?"

"Always."


End file.
